Damn dalmatian! Fury erupts after David Jones cancels Christmas window display to promote joy of … its loyalty program

Two weeks out from Christmas, the footpath outside Sydney’s flagship David Jones store would usually be packed with eager-eyed families lining up to view the retailer’s traditional festive window display.But on Friday morning, Elizabeth Street was mostly empty. An upset-looking child in a pram stared forlornly at a Valentino advertisement.Sydneysiders have come out swinging after the department store replaced its famous Christmas window display with a celebration of its new loyalty program and associated mascot, Domino the dalmatian.Sign up: AU Breaking News emailA David Jones spokesperson said the company understood “how deeply sentimental the Christmas windows are for many families”, adding it “truly appreciated the feedback”

EU’s 2035 petrol and diesel car ban will be watered down, says senior MEP

The EU’s outright ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2035 is poised to be watered down, a senior European parliament politician has said.The decision, expected to be announced by the European Commission on Tuesday in Strasbourg, would be a divisive move, angering environmental campaigners who argue it would amount to the “gutting” of the EU’s flagship green deal.The German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, said on Friday he “supported” such a climbdown, having advocated strongly for changes to the rules on the end of the combustion engine for months.“The reality is that there will still be millions of combustion engine-based cars around the world in 2035, 2040 and 2050,” he said.Under the existing laws, approved two years ago, all cars coming on the market from 2035 have to be zero CO2 emissions, meaning the end of the road for hybrid vehicles as well as those running solely on fossil fuels

Card Factory issues shock profit warning during peak Christmas period

Card Factory has delivered an unwelcome early Christmas surprise for investors by issuing a shock profit warning during the greetings card retailer’s peak trading period, which sent shares plunging by more than a fifth.The retailer, which also owns the online card and gift brand Funky Pigeon, said economic pressure on shoppers has hit confidence in its most important trading period of the year.“Over recent months, the pressures facing the UK consumer have been well publicised,” the company said in a trading update. “It is an inescapable fact that these pressures have impacted consumer confidence and shopping behaviour, contributing to soft high street footfall.“Those conditions have persisted as we moved into our most important trading period, leading to a UK store sales performance which is lower than our previous expectations

Nationwide fined £44m by watchdog for financial crime control failings

Nationwide has been fined £44m by the City watchdog over “weak” financial crime controls that culminated in a serious case of Covid fraud that cost UK taxpayers £800,000.The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) fined the building society for failures stretching over nearly five years. It said the lender had been aware that some customers were using personal accounts for business activity, in a breach of its own terms.Nationwide did not offer business accounts at that point and so did not have the right processes in place to monitor potential financial crime risks, the FCA said.This resulted in a case where Nationwide failed to catch a customer using personal current accounts to receive 24 fraudulent Covid furlough payments, totalling £27

UK economy shrank unexpectedly before budget, data shows

Britain’s economy shrank unexpectedly in October as consumers held back on spending before Rachel Reeves’s budget, and car manufacturing struggled to recover from the cyber-attack on Jaguar Land Rover.Figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed gross domestic product fell by 0.1%, after a 0.1% drop in output in September. City economists had predicted a 0

New laws may be considered after ‘harrowing stories’ from ex-Vodafone franchisees

The government may consider new laws to correct the power imbalance in franchise agreements in response to the “harrowing stories” of small business people running Vodafone stores.The move follows allegations of suicide and attempted suicide among shopkeepers who had agreed to deals to run retail outlets for the £18bn telecoms company, which were revealed by the Guardian on Monday.During Thursday’s business questions in the Commons, Justin Madders, a former minister, said: “I’m sure the department will have been aware of the coverage this week of some of the harrowing stories of the treatment of Vodafone franchisees … [The department] will no doubt recognise the power imbalance in that relationship and will they consider looking at some measures to redress that imbalance perhaps by a statutory code of practice or a national arbitration system?”Chris Bryant, a minister of state at the Department for Business and Trade, said: “I am happy to sit down with him and discuss whether there are specific proposals that we could bring forward which would address that issue of imbalance.”Outside the chamber another former business minister, Labour’s Gareth Thomas, added: “This case continues to raise disturbing echoes of the Post Office scandal and raises the question as to whether the law around franchising needs to be toughened up to ensure small-business owners are better protected.”On Monday, the Guardian revealed allegations that Adrian Howe, a former Vodafone employee who had agreed to become a franchisee in 2018, had taken his own life after becoming convinced his deal with the multinational company would prove financially disastrous